Everything Was a Dream.
In the blink of an eye, Ge Tianci's body grew lighter, his senses fading. The mantis-like arms hooked into him, as if snaring his very soul.
Now weightless, existing only as a spirit, "Smiley Face" communicated with him through thought, calling this state the "Astro-body."
His spirit floated alongside "Smiley Face" in the void. He could hear—no, *sense*—its transmissions. There were no words, only a faint pulsing between his brows, thoughts conveyed faster than light. "Smiley Face" told him: *Stand within time, become a certain apex, and space ceases to exist.*
*Conversely, move through space, and you introduce time. This is how your kind measures existence. In four-dimensional spacetime, a human's life is but a preordained worm, its cause and effect already carved.*
Suddenly, "Smiley Face's" transmission slowed by a fraction. *By the way… when you faced the guillotine in Central European civilization, did you move through space?*
Ge Tianci nodded.
"Smiley Face" fell silent. Its silence was as cruel and lifeless as the primordial universe before creation.
A mantis-arm flicked, embedding a grain-sized implant into his arm. It seeped inward slowly.
Fear struck him like a drowning man—countless near-death experiences, memories of mortality, all the sorrows of humanity crashing over him. The implant weighed down his soul, severing his connection with "Smiley Face."
Beyond telepathy, he could no longer communicate directly. "Smiley Face" was not human. It wasn't something Ge Tianci could reach by tugging his clothes or moving his lips.
He didn't know how long the disconnection lasted before his spirit was hooked again, lowered to the ground by "Smiley Face." Clearly, this was yet another dimension.
**The Forty-Third Civilization.**
The moment his feet touched down, spacetime regained texture. A cold wind lashed at him, and he felt human again.
As "Smiley Face" released him, his senses returned. He reached out swiftly, snatching at its mask—but in the warped seams of spacetime, human effort was pitifully insignificant. The mask didn't budge.
"Smiley Face" removed it, revealing the face of a mantis.
Then, it vanished.
A chunk of his memory seemed to empty. Only a vague phrase remained in his mind: *The forty-third civilization…*
His body was formless now, drifting, moving instantly with mere thought.
But some things were unstoppable.
Never before had he felt such profound sorrow—the grief of the dead, the despair of the hopeless, the helplessness of all existence… It clung like a prolonged suffocation, inescapable. Everything was wrenched apart. Flesh torn, corpses piled, the agony before death, the ceaseless whispers of obsession… Tangled, tangled. The implant lay dormant, yet Ge Tianci's heart nearly shattered.
"Smiley Face" was long gone.
Before arriving, he'd heard it say: *Thought is another human ability. Thought is far more powerful than the brain's control.*
Burdened by grief, Ge Tianci began testing his will, focusing his mind. Time and space lost meaning. The greatest advantage of the 43rd civilization was that he experienced it as a spirit—meaning that despite the implant, his physical sensations were drastically dulled. Shrapnel exploding against his leg only made him frown.
As his psychic strength grew, he sensed the implant's frequency resisting him. It was like an unyielding lock. He hammered at it with concentrated will, blow after blow. Though the lock held firm, each impact reaffirmed his own existence.
Ge Tianci didn't dare relent. Sensory input faded into irrelevance. His spirit grew lighter; the implant shackled fear.
He didn't know how long this absolute focus lasted before a gale surged around him. The civilization drew its curtain.
Tears spilled uncontrollably. The sorrow of the 43rd civilization had found its narrow, clogged outlet—human tear ducts. He wept violently, unable to see his surroundings.
An immeasurable time later, when half his shirt was soaked, he blinked blearily and saw a girl in the distance. Her bracelet was silver-gray, the same hue as his implant.
She toyed with it, as if admiring it. He'd never forget her eyes—crystalline, gleaming, untouched by the world's cruelty.
*Like crystal…* he thought. Then she vanished.
The sight of her stirred something human in him. He wiped his tears roughly.
Looking up, he found himself in unfamiliar wilderness. His will had carried him out of the 43rd civilization, depositing him here.
*No matter how bad, it's better than the guillotine,* he told himself.
The girl's face resurfaced in his mind. She was his age. The word *kindred* reignited his humanity, and exhaustion crashed over him. Only then did he notice the rivers of stars flowing between worlds around him.
The sight summoned myths—Kuafu splitting the heavens, Western gods shaping creation, the primordial chaos tearing open from below.
His thoughts, like a child's, scattered as he relaxed. He thought of the ocean. The ocean, the sky, the stars—three unknowns.
Too vast. So vast that hope and despair ultimately amounted to nothing. The stars.
*Could civilizations exist upon them?*
Nebulae streaked past, transcending mere beauty. After so long with "Smiley Face," even grandeur felt hollow. Humans wrote poems, projecting their shallow sorrows onto these eternal vistas. Civilizations came and went here.
The thought hollowed him further. His human heart wavered, aching for that girl.
The implant pulsed in response.
Will had power, but his mind was weary. On impulse, he condensed a nebula beneath him—large enough to lie on. But as he reclined, another nebula nearby twisted into something else.
A burst of cold gas sprayed out. The implant's grip on him tightened violently, paralyzing his thoughts.
*Something was trying to control him through the implant!*
It was a nebula.
Streaked in gray-blue, dusted with starlight.
*Andromeda? Boötes? Arcturus?* The names flitted through his mind—all constellations "Smiley Face" had taught him.
The nebula darkened, emitting another gas.
*It's alive,* he realized.
*A civilization—one among the stars!*
Past human civilizations, whether benevolent or hostile, were at least recognizable. But here, wrestling with the implant, wielding his will, he'd briefly touched a realm where he could communicate beyond species.
Gathering strength, he tried connecting with the nebula. The implant's power had grown, yet through these struggles, Ge Tianci had gained something ineffable—a strength beyond life and death.
A light neither good nor evil. Individuals mattered, but civilizations rose and fell in greater movements. His right hand clenched over the implant unconsciously. This understanding, in some way, exhausted him.
Fate wasn't kind. The implant *had* been strengthened—by the nebula. He tried focusing again, but a strange pain flared between his brows. Defeated, he gave up. After the nebula's third emission, he understood only one thing: *Hostility.*
That was the civilization's answer.
It didn't harm him further. The implant in his left arm quieted. He gestured, mouthing words, trying every possible expression of goodwill.
The nebula dispersed.
Again, he thought of the girl. Was she like him? A fellow sufferer in this boundless universe?
The nebula was gone. Survival demanded concealment… and the implant controlled him now. In the transmission of terror, the nebula had won.
After it left, Ge Tianci couldn't muster his will again. Until—
"Smiley Face" found him.
He sneezed three times in a row.